


We Die to Be Born

by ViaLethe



Category: Greek and Roman Mythology
Genre: F/M, POV Female Character, Polyamory, Rebirth, Yuletide 2012, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-24
Updated: 2012-12-24
Packaged: 2017-11-22 04:58:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/606063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ViaLethe/pseuds/ViaLethe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He has always been the extremes, all or nothing, while she serves as his fulcrum point, the balance of the aspects between them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	We Die to Be Born

**Author's Note:**

  * For [joy_shines](https://archiveofourown.org/users/joy_shines/gifts).



Rebirth is such a difficult thing, every time. 

First there must come the leaving; even balanced by the gain on the other side, their parting is always sharp, and hard to bear.

“It seems so simple,” he muses, down in the darkness, examining the petals of one of her delicate silver-sheen nightblooms as close as he would a soul bound for judgment. “Pushing up through the earth, and opening. So much easier than returning below.”

_But it isn't_ , she wants to say. All that weight above, all the light and heat and joy she knows awaits, but having to put forth the effort, to push through the suffocating space between, and all in the shell of such a fragile thing. She is well used to death; it is her constant companion for half the year, and she is used to birth as well. But to have them follow so close on one another is a thing only a god could endure, she thinks, and even then, she is the sole one among them to endure it with such regularity.

She says none of this, but perhaps he knows nonetheless, wrapping his arms around her in an embrace strong as the earth's, breathing against her ear. “I'll be there. I am always with you.”

He never breaks; never so much as cracks, though she wonders at times if he might want to, if he finds the weight of the Underworld too much to carry, the bargain he's made with her too difficult to keep. If he ever grows tired of being the ghost of the gods, the darkness that they shun despite his wisdom, despite the way he shoulders his kingdom with an ease born of tight discipline.

“I know you are,” she murmurs against the cool skin of his shoulder, and savors this last moment, tangling her fingers in his black curls as though she could hold onto him forever. 

Then she breathes in his kingdom, and dies.

For a split second that lasts an eternity, she hangs alone, a bright seed in the black.

When she wakes again, as she must, blooming under the sunlight, it's to the taste of fruit on her lips, and a voice humming around her, fingers moving against her shoulder, keeping time.

“You ought to leave music to Apollo,” she says drowsily, without opening her eyes. “It isn't your strong suit.”

“My strong suit is whatever I choose, my dear,” he says mildly.

She breathes in spring, warm and damp, deliciously scented, and relishes the feeling of his skin under hers, hot and so very much alive. “Your strong suit is being vain and grandiose-”

“And utterly perfect?” he interrupts, bending so his shadow falls over her face, casting her eyes into shade, before pressing his lips to hers.

He tastes of honey and spice, wine and nectar, drowning her senses like a river, heating her straight through her core, leaving her flushed and breathless, her mind swimming in a pleasant haze.

She forgets, every time, how tactile it is to be above; how tactile _he_ is. He is never still, never at rest; their encounters leave her always gasping for more, aching to possess him in a way that never quite comes to fruition, their pairings frenzied and filled to overflowing with passion and abandon.

“Isn't it better this way?” he whispers, laying himself over her, his hands skimming over her skin, making her blood come alive to run and sing like sap through the waking trees. “Isn't it better here?”

_No_ , she thinks, but doesn't answer aloud, twining her hands in his copper hair and wrapping her legs tight around him, determined to match him here, to make this mutual as they become part of each other.

Afterward, when they lay spent in the grass, feeling new growth spring up beneath her, tickling along her spine, she tells him, “There is no _better_. There is only different.” They lie hardly connected now, physically; only their hands joined, his thumb stroking over her knuckles with barely restrained energy. “Did you think I should love the bright more than the dark,” she asks, turning her face to his, watching the sudden wariness in his eyes, so like an animal tensing to flee, “simply because it is bright?”

He contains his impulses with a visible effort, jaw working as he breaks their gaze and looks up to the sky, and she thinks in that moment that she can see a flash of Hades in him, in the restraint and discipline. “ _This_ is your world,” he says thickly. “Where you belong. Why should you not prefer it, every part and piece of it?”

“Because we learn to change,” she says, and shifts to lie against him, the sheen of sweat on her skin cooling, leaving her chilled; as ever, he burns from within. “Because the light cannot exist without the darkness, nor wild abandon without measured control. All things must have their counter.”

She can sense his frown in the way his muscles twitch beneath her, restless. He has ever been this way, all or nothing, from one side of the pendulum to the other, while she serves as his fulcrum point, the balance of the aspects between them.

Still, he quiets beneath her touch, and his breathing slows, his acceptance of her wisdom bestowed in a kiss pressed to the waves of her hair, in his arms wrapping tight around her.

“I'll need to run,” he says eventually, as the stars brighten the sky above them. “The Maenads will have their dance.”

“Of course,” she says, for this is a constant; there are always other concerns, other duties, other adventures before them. And she has her own life to renew, to create while she still can. “You must live your summer, as I live mine. But not yet. That is for the morning, and a new sunrise.”

Lips pressed to his shoulder, she breathes him in; honey and spice and wine, and below that the dark chill of the earth, lingering still.


End file.
